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Thunderbird Downloading entire Yahoo Inbox

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KiwiKay
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Thunderbird Downloading entire Yahoo Inbox

Something's happened, and I don't know whether to problem lies with Thunderbird or Yahoo, but I've been using this app for a long time (now have v. 3.1.1) and when I go to download my current mail, it starts to download all of it (over 20,000 msgs). I kept restarting app and computer, etc, and emailed Yahoo for support (no reply after a week). Finally I just let it download since I couldn't get to my recent mail before the oldest was downloaded). I can't simply access yahoo online because I need use of my templates, etc that I've setup in Thunderbird.

Now, after coming back from holiday, when I try to GetMail, Thunderbird just hangs on the "checking Inbox for new messages".

How do I solve or further investigate this problem? Using Vista.

Thanks,
Jennifer

John T. Haller
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Use IMAP

Be sure to use IMAP not POP with Yahoo. And TB will download everything so it can index. I don't know if there are additional settings for what it will see like there are for Gmail. You should absolutely not have that many messages in your inbox, though. They should be in folders.

Sometimes, the impossible can become possible, if you're awesome!

KiwiKay
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Last seen: 3 years 11 months ago
Joined: 2010-03-25 05:24
Clarification Please

Thanks for the reply John. I haven't changed any of my mail setting in eons, but I just looked at my Thunderbird Server Settings, and I don't see where there's a choice. The top of the window says Server Type: POP Mail Server, and that's not an option. The server name I have pop.mail.yahoo.com.au I believe was the one on the directions I read when I set this up.

I looked at my Yahoo Account, you're only able to toggle on/off whether or not you want your mailed POPed. But, again, nothing's change on this as far as something I've done.

Yes, in Thunderbird, I run my filters and my mail's gone off to various filters (or deleted), but nothing happens to it in Yahoo. It just sits there after it's been downloaded, as goes from "unread" to "read" (or so it's supposed to).

Thanks, Jennifer

John T. Haller
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Different Server

You should be using the IMAP server, not POP. When TB encounters a POP inbox with 20,000 messages in it, it's gonna download all 20,000 of them, at least to my knowledge. You should be using folders within Yahoo itself and moving them off to other places, ideally with IMAP. You should check Yahoo's instructions for using IMAP.

UPDATE: I checked and Yahoo charges for IMAP access, so you can either pay or do one of the hacks to enable it:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yahoo!_Mail#Free_IMAP_and_SMTPs_access

Said hacks are outside the scope of the assistance we can do.

You could always switch to a provider that enables IMAP access like Gmail.

[Link linkified by Chris, Drupal's URL filter doesn't like !]

Sometimes, the impossible can become possible, if you're awesome!

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